1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus, an information processing method, and a storage medium.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, image forming apparatuses have transmitted a power supply state notification packet to an information processing apparatus in a local area network (hereinafter referred to as a LAN). This technique realizes such a system that the information processing apparatus in the LAN receives this power supply state notification packet, and acquires the state of the image forming apparatus based on information in this packet. For example, an image forming apparatus transmits a power supply state notification packet to an information processing apparatus when the image forming apparatus is powered on. Upon receiving this power supply state notification packet indicating that the image forming apparatus is powered on, the information processing apparatus acquires option information of the hardware of the image forming apparatus and the state (whether an error or the like occurs) of the image forming apparatus. Further, upon a shift to a sleep state, the image forming apparatus transmits a power supply state notification packet indicating the shift to the sleep state to the information processing apparatus. The information processing apparatus can detect that the image forming apparatus has shifted to the sleep state by receiving this power supply state notification packet, and stops acquiring information regarding the image forming apparatus if necessary. As a result, the information processing apparatus refrains from transmitting an unnecessary inquiry packet to the image forming apparatus, whereby the image forming apparatus can be maintained in the sleep state. On the other hand, upon returning from the sleep state, the image forming apparatus transmits to the LAN a power supply state notification packet indicating the return. Therefore, upon receiving this packet, the information processing apparatus restarts acquiring information of the image forming apparatus. Further, in recent years, there has been an application that detects the power supply state of an image forming apparatus, calculates the power consumption of the image forming apparatus, and displays this value in the form of a list (hereinafter referred to as a power calculation application). This power calculation application is located in the information processing apparatus in the LAN, and detects the power supply state of the image forming apparatus based on a power supply state notification packet transmitted from the image forming apparatus to calculate the power consumption amount. Therefore, when a predetermined time has elapsed or the power supply state changes, the image forming apparatus has to immediately transmit a power supply state notification packet indicating that. However, the image forming apparatus is not necessarily constantly in a powered-on state, whereby the image forming apparatus may be in a powered-off state at the time that the image forming apparatus is supposed to transmit a power supply state notification packet. As a method that can solve this problem, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2003-30061 discusses such a method that, in a case where a power supply state notification time has come when an image forming apparatus is in a powered-off state, the image forming apparatus transmits a power supply state notification packet next time the image forming apparatus is powered on, even if a next notification time has not come yet. According to this method, the power calculation application can further accurately calculate the power consumption of the image forming apparatus.
However, there is generally known such a system that, when shutting down an image forming apparatus which a printing control apparatus is connected to, a user manually performs a shutdown operation on each of the printing control apparatus and the image forming apparatus to cause each apparatus to individually perform shutdown processing. Therefore, when the user starts up only the image forming apparatus to use a copy function of the image forming apparatus or select a screen setting or the like of the image forming apparatus, the printing control apparatus may be in a powered-off state. The system in which the printing control apparatus is connected to the image forming apparatus is such a system that the printing control apparatus temporarily acquires a power supply state notification packet transmitted from the image forming apparatus, and transfers it to an information processing apparatus existing in the LAN. Therefore, when the above-described printing control apparatus is in a powered-off state and only the image forming apparatus is in a powered-on state, the power supply state notification packet transmitted from the image forming apparatus can never be delivered to the information processing apparatus existing in the LAN.